Blog Archive

If you want to publish your own books or just want to read online materials in print, learning how to bind handmade books is a great idea. It is not hard to do and only requires simple household materials.

You will need:

Cold glue

Scissors

A razor knife

And that is really it. A guillotine cutter does help a lot, but it isn't required.

The advantages to binding your own books are numerous. You'll save money and get sometimes better results than you would with a professional publishing company.

You can also bind photo albums, ebooks, pictures you've printed, or even books you've written yourself, like childrens' books.

You won't need any additional software to bind your books; all you need is a simple handmade bookbinding guide. This will show you how to actually build your bookbinding machine - and you don't need expensive equipment to make it.

This homemade bookbinding machine will also let you bind hardbacks if you wish, though you will need cardboard to complete that process.

This guide also teaches you how to spiral bind books, if you are making a notebook-style book or a how to guide, or anything you wish to have a spiral binding for.

Surprisingly, it only takes 1-5 minutes to bind your own books once you become familiar with the process. It can take as long as 20-30 minutes for the glue to set, but that is the longest stretch of time required to bind your book.